Before starting school..

Don't try to learn any specific anesthesia stuff. Make sure that your REALLY know the stuff that you use in the unit. Don't just know that norepi is a vasopressor or increases SVR and CO but know each specific receptor, onset and duration of action, etc. Know this for every sedation and vasoactive/cardiac drug you give in the unit. Also study the autonomic nervous system and receptors until you can recite every single one and the effect from memory. These are a common theme throughout school from day 1.

Another thing that REALLY helped me was that I started using the ultrasound machine in our unit to put in peripheral IVs. It is actually a very tricky skill to learn to use a ultrasound and guide a needle while not looking at it. It is a skill that you use for a lot of different procedures and one that I saw many of my classmates really struggle to learn while I had an easy time because I had practiced it. Learning nerve blocks was easier because driving a needle under ultrasound was not new to me. Even if you can do 10-20 IVs under US before school it will make the learning curve much easier on you.

Thanks! That is very helpful. I'll start working on the receptor/actions now.

I'm lucky in that I have ultrasound experience already too...I was on a hospitals RRT team and one of the skills they had us trained in was peripheral IVs under ultrasound and I took to it it very well---I prefer using that on hard sticks because I can actually see that I'm in. Good to know that the skills will transfer over to blocks!

Hey DreamRN where are you headed for school?